Living in the Midwest myself, I don't think there's any shortage of work available. Doesn't pay as well as living in California, but I also paid $100k for my house.
Curious, but have you (or anyone else reading this) tried out working as a developer online? I've got this nagging dream of moving to Kentucky, buying 20 acres and a mansion for $250K, and finishing out my career working online in my underwear.
Yes, but I typically wear pants as I frequently need to hop on video calls. I suppose they can only see the chest up, but you never know if the laptop will fall off the table.
We have a fully remote team and all our devs live in locations cheaper than the Bay Area as does most of the rest of the team. We have more than one person living in a ski resort and some living in fairly rural areas as well as some living in cheaper cities.
Anecdotally, it's easier for established developers. If you've been with a company for a while, or you have in-demand skills, it's easier to find remote work.
Once you're established a reputation in a company and been there for a while, it is relatively easy to go remote with them. It is always a temptation.
The risk is what happens when that job is done and you find yourself in the boonies with no meaningful tech work within hundreds of miles?
I was at Sun during the era when they made a big push to get people to give up their offices (save on real estate) and go remote, work from anywhere! It was so tempting to move to Hawaii and keep the silicon valley salary. I'm glad I didn't. I know many people who did. When Sun was over, they found themselves owning farmland in the middle of nowhere, no job and no possibility of getting one in the area.
